souffle_girlek | (no subject)

Autor also has a routine. He's been leaving Oswin rose tea and homemade lebkuchens with cinnamon and cloves--treats to suit her favorite scents--for days to entreat her out of her room. It's not unusual for her to stay in her room for extended periods of time, but this time, the boy knows he's the one who chased her here.

He accused her of spying on him--when she was helping him, no less!--and made her feel unsafe.

Autor draws a breath through his nose and knocks on the door, balancing today's tea tray in his other hand. "Oswin? I'm not scared of you. Please come out."

She should ignore him.

She should, she knows this. She should order the bots to stop bringing the tea and treats inside, she should barricade the door, and she should ignore him.

It'd be safer. For all involved.

But she hasn't talked to anyone in days, and... well. Even in the Asylum, there was always something to do.

Cautiously she creeps to the door. It's a few minutes before she replies, and honestly, she's pretty sure she's talking to an empty hallway. Why would he stay?

"Yes you are. And it's alright, really, I know, I... you should stop. Coming, I mean."

Autor doesn't know what to do now. He should probably respect her wishes and leave. But he feels guilty for chasing her into her room. She felt safe, safe enough to come out and mingle, and he had to go and make her feel unsafe again.

"Oswin, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he says, setting the tray down. "I made you feel unsafe and... and that's wrong. I... I didn't treat you as if you were my friend. Please forgive me."

Oswin leaps back from the door as if scalded. He's still out there!

Double bother. It really would have been more easy if the hallway had been empty.

She should stay silent. Let the closed door be the only answer, and let him go. Make him go. But then he'll go on blaming himself, and she can't really have that.

"You shouldn't be friends with things that scare you."

Autor presses his cheek and ear and palm against the door, listening. "You're not a thing," the boy says, and sighs. "Even if you have abilities that scare me because I don't understand them, you are my friend, and I'll be able to look past them. Okay?"

He waits a little bit, forming his words. "To be frank, what you can do is really cool, and useful, and I shouldn't have accused you of spying on me like I did. That was cruel."

"It's... You're fine. Really. I mean, you're right, you know you're right, I'm..." The word cracks, and she pulls in on herself, giving the door a frustrated glance. "I'll leave you alone, don't worry."

Autor rests his clenched fist on the door, just as frustrated. "Look, who cares if I'm right? Go ahead. My life is boring," he says, furrowing his brow. "If... If you spy on me you'll find out that I care about you regardless. All right? I love you, Oswin Oswald. I'll be your friend no matter what."

Edited 2015-01-15 05:02 (UTC)

"No, you don't, you... you don't," She repeats sternly, scoldingly, "You're feeling sorry, because you're decent, and I'm telling you that you shouldn't be, so you can go back to your life."

You aren't friends with the monsters. The Predator taught her that.

"Yes, I do," Autor insists, pressing against the door. "I don't want to go back to any life that doesn't include you. Yes, I'm feeling sorry, and no, I'm not decent--er... I mean... I'm dressed, and I'm decent that way, but, uh, I'm not a decent person, really, but... but that's beside the point, and uh, if you come out you'll see that I'm fully clothed..."

She can probably see through her monitors haw badly he's blushing, and how upset his expression is. "Anyway, I'm feeling sorry because I love you, and I don't want to see you hurt, not because I'm--you know what I mean."

"I'm not hurt." She lies, fairly convincingly.

She shouldn't be, so she feels that's truth enough.

'Did you know? You do this strange little thing with your bottom lip when you lie,' he'd told her once, and he has no doubt she's doing it now. If she wasn't hurt, she wouldn't have fled to her room.

He sinks down to a crouch, and wraps an arm around his knees. "Oswin," he murmurs, pressing his forehead and free palm against the door. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. And it's not because I'm decent, but because I did hurt you. I don't know how to tell you that I still want to be your friend, if you'll have me, and that I don't care if you spy on me or not."

She follows his voice down, cravenly seeking the thing she's trying to push away - contact.

"Why?"

"Because you're funny, and brave, and smart, and my life is better with you in it," he says immediately, brushing the door with his thumb. "Because you make ballerina cookies with whippet-thin waists, and smell like rose-oil, and took care of me when I was a kitten, and baked me croissants, and you speak French, and made me a Safe S-Sex on the Beach, and put up with me when I was a snot, and you're resilient, and make spiderbots, and give great embraces, and hate winter, and you're never afraid to tell me what you're thinking and most times I need to hear it, and I'm just so comfortable around you that when I thought you were dead I sat up and cried for hours."

Edited 2015-01-15 05:42 (UTC)

Oswin blinks owlishly at the wood.

"You thought I was dead?"

Autor goes quiet. He doesn't know if telling her this will upset her. "Yeah," he says eventually, softly. He sniffles a little. "You know how you have conversations with the dead around Halloween? Mine was with you--the you from the far, far future, which I didn't realize until halfway through."

"..... Well. That's not creepy at all."

Oswin has not heard of this particular holiday ritual. She's rather glad she didn't get that experience.

Autor shifts his position on the floor so that he's leaning his back against the door and wrapping his arms around his knees. "Yeah, sorry, I... I probably shouldn't have told you," he says, feeling that might be too little, too late. "My point is, my life is better with you in it, and I like having you as a friend."

"Yeah, but I scare you. And for good reason, and you know it." She points out. "You are allowed to have a sense of self preservation."

That's a tiny bit rich, coming from her.

Autor's tempted to beat his head against the door. They're back to square one. He could tell her plenty of scary things about him, but that wouldn't serve any purpose except to scare her.

Besides, she knows pretty much everything there is to know.

"I am allowed to have a sense of self-preservation," he admits. "And I have weighed the costs and benefits of this and decided I don't care about being scared; I'd rather have your friendship, if... if you still want to give it to me. That scares me more than the spying you're not doing, truthfully."

"I'm... I'm trying to be your friend." She grumbles. "You're the one being stubborn about it."

"You're trying to shove me away in the hopes that it'll protect me from you, whom I don't need protection from," Autor retorts, stubbornly. "Is that right?"

".... Yes." Well, it sounds kind of daft when said like that, but it's still true.

"I know you want to protect me, as my friend," Autor starts, knowing he has to phrase his words very carefully, "but that's acting out of fear for me, and the hurt that I've given you. As your friend, I don't want you to live like that, and I want you to trust me to protect myself. I wouldn't be as insistent to see you if I didn't think you were worth seeing."

Well.

Oswin... doesn't know what to say to that.

She actually really doesn't, which is an abnormality for her, and... disconcerting, to say the least.

She eyes the door for a long time.

Then she stands, and unlocks the door.

Then, she heads into the living room, because that's quite enough bravery for right now.

Autor jumps when he hears the sound of the door unlocking, and stands. The boy scoops up his tray if tea--now cold--and cookies up off the floor and opens the door.

He only pops his head in. "Oswin? Can I come in, please?"